Wrapping up an unhappy opener

So the Mets lost 6-5, but something tells me you already know that. Here’s a quick look at some postgame notes and quotes:

— Ryan Church said he simply dropped the fly ball and that Citi Field had nothing to do with it. He turned the wrong way, Church explained, and the ball hooked away from him. “I turned the wrong way,” Church said.

— Pedro Feliciano thought home plate ump Bruce Dreckman could’ve let his sixth-inning balk slide. It ultimately allowed the Padres to score the winning run. Feliciano said he hadn’t been called for a balk like that (he started his motion, then stopped it) since the minors, and that one cost his team the game, too. However, what perturbed him was that he saw David Eckstein indicate to Dreckman that it was a balk, and that Dreckman (not any of the other umps) immediately called it.

“I think right there, 5-5, the opening day game, that’s a hard time to call a balk,” Feliciano said.

— Jody Gerut’s homer didn’t just make Citi Field history. It made history, period. … The Elias Sports Bureau said it was the first time a player had homered to open the first regular season game at a new stadium. Ever.

— Mike Pelfrey wasn’t very complimentary of his pitching. Neither was Jerry Manuel, who said Pelfrey “hasn’t shown the same stuff yet” that he showed last year. … Manuel will sit down with his staff and Pelfrey and try to determine whether or not there is anything wrong with Pelfrey.

— Yes, Pelfrey slipped trying to throw a pitch tonight. Yes, he was fine. And, yes, his teammates ripped him for it. “When they came out I asked if the game was on TV,” Pelfrey said. “They said it was. It was pretty embarrassing.”

— Manuel thought the Mets must get used to the park. He hadn’t talked to Church by that point, but he thought not knowing where the wall was played a role in the gaffe. “That’s the ballpark,” Manuel said. “We have to get used to it.” … Obviously, if you saw the game, you know both Wright and Carlos Beltran hit deep drives that were caught at the wall. Here’s what Beltran had to say: “Right now, they’re not (going out of the park), but we don’t know. Maybe in the summer it’s a different story. … I hit it good, but in that case I hit it a little of the end (of the bat). I thought it would at least get over his head.”

JOSH THOMSON joined The Journal News and LoHud.com in March 2003 and has covered high school football, basketball, baseball and pro and college sports ever since. He graduated in 1998 from Carmel High School and in 2002 from Boston University with a degree in communications. Josh spends the majority of his free time with his wife and two daughters.